Whoot! I'm excited to have Angel on the blog today talking about odd and common allergies and brought along an excerpt to her new release, Lime Gelatin and Other Monsters.
Also, don't forget to leave a comment. Luck lucky people will win their choice of backlist Angel Martinez's books!
*~*~*
You’re Allergic to
What…?
When I was a kid, no
one seemed to be allergic to anything. We played in the dirt, ate
whatever the hell we wanted, ran around like crazy people in the
humid, pollen soaked air, and somehow we were just fine. Oh, sure,
occasionally, it turned out someone was allergic to bee stings and
had to be rushed to the ER, but that was high drama for us.
Somewhere along the
line, slowly, gradually, this changed, probably due to environmental
factors and things in our food but suddenly we started to hear about
kids being allergic to peanuts, to shellfish, to milk, to soy, to
eggs, and so on. Heck, I even developed a shellfish allergy later in
life in sympathy. But regardless of why it happens, food allergies
are our immune systems being drama queens. The immune system
misidentifies certain proteins in food and it overreacts, sending out
the histamine troops in packed battalions and overloading critical
systems, causing things like runny noses, hives, itching, and oh,
issues with minor things like breathing. Allergies can develop at any
time, young or old, and are sometimes linked to odd causes, like tick
bites.
No, I haven’t been
smoking anything good. Tick bites. The Lone Star tick has been linked
to an increase in what was once an exceptionally rare allergy – an
allergy to meat. Sometimes the allergy is only to mammal meats, but
not always. It sometimes extends to poultry as well. Not all meat
allergies are cause by tick bites, certainly, but the dang ticks have
made it into the news and increased awareness of an allergy that’s
particularly difficult to manage in this country. Why? Because it’s
often a delayed reaction allergy, difficult to diagnose, and because
Americans put meat in everything, to one extent or another.
A friend of mine
struggles with this every day and I’ve watched how this affects
every food decision. Did you touch that with your meat-contaminated
hands before you handed it over? Does the restaurant use a separate
grill for meat? Separate utensils? Mashed potatoes…but they have
bacon. Fried okra, but it’s made with bacon fat. You get the idea.
Suddenly you have to be aware of everything surrounding food
preparation and not just the food.
So Kyle Monroe, the
hero of Lime Gelatin, gets a meat allergy. Because it’s a thing
that happens to real people and he wanted to be as real as possible.
It’s his own fault.
*~*~*
Offbeat Crimes 1
(part of Amber Allure’s
77th Precinct Pax)
Blurb:
Officer Kyle
Monroe’s encounter with a strange gelatinous creature in an alley
leaves him scarred and forever changed, revealing odd abilities he
wishes he didn’t have and earning him reassignment to
Philadelphia’s 77th Precinct where all the cops have defective
paranormal abilities.
Just as Kyle’s
starting to adjust to his fellow misfit squad mates, his new partner
arrives. Tall, physically perfect, reserved, and claiming he has no
broken psychic talents, Vikash Soren irritates Kyle in every way. But
as much as he’d like to hate Vikash, Kyle finds himself oddly drawn
to him, their non-abilities meshing in unexpected ways.
Now, if Kyle and
Vikash can learn to work together, they just might be able to stop
the mysterious killer who has been leaving mutilated bodies along the
banks of the Schuylkill.
*~*~*
Excerpt:
Kyle sat up
straighter, shifting to see between the heads in front of him. Soren
looked like a poster boy for the model police officer, tall and
straight, uniform crisp and sharp. He stood at parade rest beside the
lieutenant, impassively surveying his new colleagues. A little knot
of resentment lodged in Kyle’s stomach. At his own introduction to
the 77th, he’d been nervous and fidgety, freaked out by the
collection of…freaks. How can he be so calm?
“Officer Soren
transferred from the Harrisburg PD—”
“Don’t they
have enough freaky shit of their own up there?” Wolf called out in
his rasping growl.
“Since
Harrisburg is in our jurisdiction,” she continued with a quelling
glance. “He’ll start out partnered with Monroe.”
“What does he
do, ma’am? That it’s safe to put him with Kirby, er, Kyle?”
Shira Lourdes asked as she flicked nervous glances across the room at
Kyle. An empty chair slid away from her and fell over. Her partner,
Greg Santos, shook his head and righted the unfortunate piece of
furniture.
“Officer
Soren’s abilities are his business, which he may or may not choose
to share if you ask. And don’t bully him about it either, any of
you.” Lieutenant Dunfee swept the room again, pinning each of her
officers with her needle-laser gaze like captive butterflies.
“Monroe, my office after briefing. Info on your current case.”
She dismissed
them, stalking from the room with thunderclouds in her eyes. Kyle
found himself approaching the new guy and trying his best not to be
awkward. Did he offer to shake hands? Was it safe? Would the guy
flinch like so many people did at the sight of Kyle’s scarred
hands? Soren was even taller up close, six-foot-three of lean
inscrutability, his blue eyes startlingly bright against smoky bronze
skin.
“Um, hi, I’m
Kyle Monroe.” Kyle fidgeted when Soren didn’t offer his hand
either. “You’re with me, I guess. I’ll show you our spot in the
squad room.”
Soren followed
him silently and Kyle was starting to wonder if he was like Krisk in
the not-speaking department until he finally spoke in a smooth, soft
baritone, making Kyle startle and miss a step. “Why do they call
you Kirby?”
“You’d hear
it sooner or later, I guess.” Kyle shrugged. “It’s this thing I
do, absorbing other people’s talents temporarily. If they’re
close to me. Or touch me. Like Kirby, the little pink dude in the
video game.”
“Ah.”
Just that?
Soren didn’t edge away, or change expression at all. Was he made of
stone? “It’s a thing. Everyone here has a thing.”
After a few more
steps, Soren asked, “Always?”
“What… Oh,
was I always like this? Who knows? I mean, maybe I’ve picked up
stray thoughts or something, but no. It’s pretty recent. Knowing
that I do this.”
Kyle took a wide
arc around Vance as he entered the squad room, pointing to the double
desk in the far corner, well removed from everyone else. “That’s
ours. Coffee’s over there, but you might not want that coffee. Let
me grab my file and we’ll go see the lieutenant.”
“So what’s
your story, Soren?” Vance called across the squad room. “What
flies your freak flag?”
“Yeah, what do
you do?” Jeff Gatling stopped ’porting his banana from one corner
of his desk to the other.
“I don’t
really do anything,” Soren answered as he hefted the empty
coffeepot. “Guess I’ll make fresh since I’m the new guy.”
He opened the
top to remove the filter and every human voice in the squad room
yelled out, “No!”
Most people
would have startled, maybe dropped the carafe. Soren just blinked at
the roomful of people gesturing wildly. He took the filter out and
emptied it over the trashcan. “Why not?”
“You don’t
want to do that.” Kyle stayed by his desk, a nice safe distance
from the coffee station. “That’s Larry’s job.”
“Larry’s not
keeping up then.”
The container of
sweetener packets began to rattle. It shivered across the counter and
leaped to a messy end, ceramic shards skittering across the floor.
The desk that Krisk and Wolf shared rose from the floor several
inches and slammed back down. Wolf fled with a squeaking yelp just
before the desk flipped on its side.
Soren glanced
toward Kyle. “Larry’s not a cop, is he?”
“He is…he
was! A dead cop. Larry’s a ghost. He gets ticked if anyone else
makes the coffee. Put the stuff back, please!”
“Larry?”
Soren raised his voice but to all appearances remained completely
unruffled. “I’m new here. I’m very sorry I invaded your
jurisdiction. See? I’m putting the carafe back. Closing the top.
Are we good, Larry?”
A breeze ruffled
through a stack of papers, but no further mayhem ensued. The carafe
slid from its pad on the coffeemaker and floated to the water cooler
where Larry, who never manifested in a visible form, whistled
tunelessly while he filled the carafe.
From his dim
corner of the room, Carrington said in his dry, genteel way, “Welcome
to the Island of Misfit Freaks...”
*~*~*
Giveaway:
2 commenters will be
chosen at random (’cause I have a formula to do that and
everything) for their choice of backlist Angel Martinez book!
*~*~*
About the Author:
Angel Martinez
is the erotic fiction pen name of a writer of several genres. Her
experiences as a soldier, a nurse, a banker, and an underpaid
corporate drone give her a broad view of the world and a deep
appreciation for the astounding variety of people on this small
planet.
She currently
lives part time in the hectic sprawl of northern Delaware and full
time inside her head. She has one husband of over twenty years, one
son, two cats, a love of all things beautiful and a terrible
addiction to the consumption of both knowledge and chocolate.
To contact Angel with
praise, adulation, sarcasm, and complaints to the management (any
management, she’s not picky, but it might not solve your flight
reservation issue) please try these linky things:
Thank you for stopping by and reading!!
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